Column-oriented data stores, such as BigTable and HBase, have successfully paved the way for managing large key-value datasets with random accesses. At the same time, the declining cost of flash SSDs has enabled their use in several applications including large databases. In this paper, the authors explore the feasibility of introducing flash SSDs for HBase. Since storing the entire user data is infeasible due to impractically large costs, they perform a qualitative and supporting quantitative assessment of the implications of storing the system components of HBase in flash SSDs.